


These Are Great Days

by atlanticslide



Category: Hollyoaks
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Hopeful Ending, M/M, References to Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-21
Updated: 2011-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-27 17:20:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/298191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atlanticslide/pseuds/atlanticslide
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’s still got some of that surreal feeling, but it’s slipping more and more each day, leaving him feeling achy but alive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	These Are Great Days

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thisissirius](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisissirius/gifts).



> So, I had a weird brain-fart when reading your request and kept reading "post-Scotland" as "post-Ireland" (which is a really dumb mistake, I know) and thinking "well I guess she just means something set once they've both gotten to Dublin" and, long story short, this might be closer in time to the "sunset ending" time period than I think you may have preferred, so apologies for that, but I hope you enjoy nonetheless!

It’s early September. Kieron’s dead on the floor. John Paul can’t breathe. He can still just feel where Craig’s hand had rested on his hip not an hour ago.

-

It’s late September. Kieron is long since in the ground, and John Paul still feels shaky and surreal most days, like this life isn’t really quite happening to him.

He wants Craig, and he doesn’t. He wants Kieron back, but it doesn’t matter. He wants them both, and he wants to be happy, and it’s too soon to go with Craig, to kiss him, to touch him even, but he lets himself settle into Craig’s arms when they hug.

He goes home, and he thinks about Craig, thinks about Kieron. He tries to work it out, for the millionth time.

Suicide, it must’ve been, but Kieron would never. He wasn’t unhappy – they were bickering, but okay. John Paul was going to leave him, but he didn’t know that yet.

Kieron believed deeply, wholly. He wouldn’t have committed an act at such odds to his religion.

But then, he did have sex with John Paul. A lot. Which, depending on who you asked, broke all kinds of rules. And they had an affair while Kieron was still a priest, even, so it’s not like Kieron was opposed to going against his religion here and there.

Maybe John Paul really had corrupted him, broken him, destroyed him.

He’s not sure what to do with that.

-

He goes after Craig. He’s seen too well now how life can be short and full of anguish and tragedy and terrible things. He vows to grab hold of something good when it’s offered to him.

Craig kisses him, right there in the middle of the train station, with a hundred people around. They can’t stop smiling at each other after that. It’s the easiest smile that’s come to John Paul in weeks.

He’s certain Kieron would never begrudge him that.

-

Craig’s hand twitches in John Paul’s and John Paul throws him a reassuring grin.

Craig smiles back awkwardly, then clears his throat. Then again, louder.

“Uh – guys?” he calls to his roommates finally. The three men sprawled across the floor look up from the television screen one by one.

“Hiya Craig, how was the trip?” one says, glancing at their clasped hands and then at John Paul. “Whose your friend?”

John Paul likes him already.

Craig runs his thumb over John Paul’s, a nervous gesture more than trying to comfort. John Paul remembers it well. His heart starts beating faster.

All three look curious rather than angry or offended, which calms John Paul just a bit. Maybe Craig too. It’s hard to tell.

“John Paul, this is Jake, Freddy, James,” Craig nods to each one in turn. “Jake, Freddy, James, this is John Paul, my, uh – ”

John Paul holds his breath.

“My boyfriend.” Craig swallows, shifts his feet. He squeezes John Paul’s hand tightly, and John Paul lets out his breath. He holds back his smile.

James nods sagely, like this is deeply important news, while Freddy, the one who’d spoken up first, gets a hint of a smile to his expression. Jake’s brow furrows.

“Since when?” Jake asks, sounding not quite offended.

Craig shrugs, drops his bag to the floor so he can scratch the back of his neck. “Since… well, it’s a long story. Since a while.”

James nods again while Freddy says simply, “Huh.”

Jake still looks confused. “But. But you were with Colleen. Just last month. You’re a poof?” Freddy elbows him in the ribs, but Jake goes on uninterrupted. “And Jenny Franks before that. You’re a poof?” he asks again.

“I’m not,” Craig answers, but he doesn’t sound quite so biting about it as he used to, and John Paul knows that shouldn’t comfort him as much as it does.

“S’not really any of your business,” Craig continues, lifting his head so his chin juts out a bit. “But I’m… bi. I guess. Haven’t given it much thought. Doesn’t matter – John Paul and I are together and if any of you’ve got a problem with it, then…”

He obviously doesn’t know quite how to finish that thought, but the intent is clear enough, and Jake sits up, raises his hands quickly.

“No, no, ‘course not, s’fine, you’re fine, mate.” He smiles and looks uncomfortable. “Just curious is all.”

“Nice to meet you, John,” James says, getting up from the floor to walk over and offer John Paul a hand.

“It’s John Paul, actually,” Craig interjects, but John Paul shrugs.

“No, it’s fine, whatever,” John Paul says, and smiles a bit nervously. He’s never usually nervous about meeting new people – rarely, in fact – but he feels a bit skittish at the moment, and shrugs his bag further back on his shoulder so that he can shake James’s hand.

“You gonna be staying with us a while, John Paul?” Freddy asks, rising from the floor as well. He doesn’t shake John Paul’s hand, but his demeanor is casual, friendly enough that John Paul relaxes a bit.

“Guess so,” he replies with a shrug. “If that’s alright with you all, that is. Hadn’t thought much about it, actually.”

“Yeah,” Craig adds, nudging John Paul’s shoulder with his own. “This was all a bit… spur of the moment.”

“Sure, ‘course it’s fine, stay as long s’you like,” James says, clapping John Paul on the shoulder like they’re old buddies.

Jake still hasn’t said much else, which makes John Paul a bit wary, but Craig squeezes his hand again.

He’s still got some of that surreal feeling, but it’s slipping more and more each day, leaving him feeling achy but alive.

They lay in bed later, he and Craig, and John Paul looks around the room, trying to picture Craig here in it for the past year. He tries not to picture other people in here with Craig. Craig looks at him all the meanwhile.

“You alright?” Craig asks quietly, like he’s afraid he might spook John Paul and send him running back to Chester.

John Paul turns his eyes back to Craig. “Think so,” he replies, equally soft. They’re on their sides facing each other, noses just a few inches apart. It’s hard to believe, really.

Six months ago John Paul would never have believed that they’d be here like this, ever. Two months ago he wouldn’t have even wanted this (maybe… maybe he was fooling himself thinking that there’d ever be anyone but Craig for him… maybe he was fooling Kieron, and himself, all that time, and that hurts too much to think about). Craig must see something in his expression change or darken, because he brushes his fingertips across John Paul’s forehead and down along his temple, more careful and gentle than John Paul can ever remember him being. He wonders how much of Craig has changed in the past year – he’s still intense, still reactive, it seems, but there’s something more calm about this Craig than John Paul remembers of him. Like maybe he’s actually content, where he never quite was back then, before.

“What do you wanna do tomorrow?” Craig asks him.

Tomorrow’s Saturday. John Paul smiles without really meaning to, still a great feat. “Anything. We can do anything we want.”

Craig smiles back at him. “Yes we can. Let’s.”

-

It’s early October and too late to register for classes, so John Paul figures he’ll for something else to do with himself. He wanders around the Trinity campus, killing time while waiting to meet Craig, thinks about putting up some flyers to advertise himself as a DJ for hire. It’s been a while and he’s found himself missing it.

He passes by what looks to be a student counseling center and doesn’t take much notice until he almost walks into several racks with brochures sat stacked around the doorway, and John Paul hesitates a moment, clenching his jaw, when he sees the word _SUICIDE _written in big, block letters on the cover of one.__

 _He glances through - Prevention. Treatment. Help. Comfort. Support._

 _ _Have you lost someone to suicide?_ _

He drops it back to the stack and walks away quickly. His heart is beating wildly.

Thirty minutes later and Craig still hasn’t gotten out of class, and John Paul wanders back towards the counseling center. He edges towards the suicide brochures, unsure of what he’s quite afraid of, but feeling itchy and scared nonetheless. He glances at the word _SUICIDE_ again and fingers the corner of one of the brochures, finally holds his breath as he opens one up.

His eyes scan over several sections, fall on _WARNING SIGNS_ -

 _Appearing depressed or sad.  
Talking about death.  
Writing a will.  
Losing interest in activities.  
Change in eating habits.  
Withdrawing from family or friends._

None of it seems to fit Kieron’s last few weeks. John Paul goes over the last time he saw Kieron, goes over their last few days together, and he can’t think of a thing that would have set off any warning bells. Reading on, though, he wonders –

 _Feeling excessive guilt or shame._ John Paul’s chest burns.

 _Feeling trapped, like there is no way out of a situation._ Could he have? Did John Paul ever make him feel like that? Did Craig’s reappearance make him feel trapped, knowing that he might lose John Paul after already giving up the Church?

 _Some people may show no clear warning signs at all._ It makes John Paul want to scream, to rage. He can feel his hands shaking.

“Can I help you with something?” A voice startles him out of his thoughts and John Paul drops the brochure back to the stack, looks up at the man in front of him with wide eyes.

“I…” he trails off, unsure really what he means to say.

The man, an older fellow with graying hair at his temples and glasses perched on the end of his nose, nods like he understands without John Paul having said anything.

“Would you like to talk about anything?” he asks, nodding towards the stack of brochures.

John Paul follows his line of sight and stuffs his hands in his pockets. He’s not really sure that he does, and yet, he finds himself saying, “My boyfriend… well, fiancé, we’d just…”

He trails off, surprised by the sudden lump in his throat. “Anyway, he, uh. He took some pills. A few weeks ago. He overdosed. The police said he meant to kill himself.” Tears spring to his eyes, but he doesn’t wipe them away. “I just wanted to know why.”

The man is quiet a moment, then, “Would you like to come in for a bit? We have coffee, tea, terribly dry biscuits.”

John Paul struggles out a smile and nods. He doesn’t really want to talk much about Kieron, but once he sits down with the man – Carl, the director of the counseling center, whose son died some years ago of a drug addiction and then overdose, John Paul learns after a bit – the words begin tumbling out.

It doesn’t ease the hurt of not knowing quite what was in Kieron’s head during his last moments, but something feels soothing about the tea and the chat and the presence of someone who doesn’t know anything about Kieron or Craig or John Paul’s family.

-

It’s nearing the end of October and John Paul feels… content. Sort of.

He likes Dublin. It’s already getting cold and rainy and usually he hates this time of year, but he finds it oddly comforting lately.

He’s found a couple of DJ nights at clubs around the city – nothing regular yet, but he tries to remind himself that it’ll take longer to establish himself in a city this size versus a village the size of Hollyoaks with only one real club.

They laugh, he and Craig. They talk about music and football and Craig’s classes. There’s no hesitation to their touches; they kiss like they haven’t missed a whole year of being in each other’s orbits. They watch movies with Craig’s flatmates – John Paul’s now too, he supposes – and Craig lets John Paul’s head rest on his shoulder without objection, works his way towards holding John Paul’s fingers loosely in his own, and no one comments on it.

John Paul dreams at night of Kieron lying in his own vomit, but he wakes to the warmth and weight of Craig’s arms strewn carelessly, bonelessly across his chest, and he can turn his face to tuck his nose against Craig’s cheek and the familiar scent, one which made him ache once, helps his heart slow to a peaceful beat from the fury it had been at as he woke.

He goes to the student counseling center near every day now, begins training to work at the suicide prevention hotline. He can almost feel Kieron smiling at that, and the idea of helping someone else through their rough times makes his own a little easier, somehow. Maybe he’ll get some of the answers he craves through other people.

Craig never brings up Kieron, though he asks sometimes, when catching John Paul in a dazed out thought, if John Paul wants to “talk about anything”. He knows full well to what Craig’s referring, but John Paul chooses to take the out and will give Craig his winningest smile and say that, yes, he’d love to talk about the book Craig’s reading for his philosophy class or where John Paul might be spinning this weekend. He’s not quite sure, but he thinks Craig may look rather relieved when John Paul changes the subject for something lighter.

-

They have sex, for the first time since _that_ time, and John Paul lets himself stare at Craig, touch his shoulders and his back and stroke his thighs the way he remembers Craig likes and kiss Craig’s chin and run his tongue over Craig’s lower lip and lets himself let go. Craig looks almost wild when he comes and John Paul doesn’t, for a few moments, try to work out how he’s able to have this all again. He lets himself close his eyes and press his forehead to Craig’s and they breathe together.

-

He gets a text from Michaela asking him to come home for Jacqui’s birthday, and he thinks about making up some excuse not to go – he’s been avoiding his mum and his sisters since he left, though he’s not quite sure why. Wanting to make a fresh start, maybe. But he feels badly about ignoring them, especially on a birthday, and he needs some stuff from home anyway, so he books a flight last minute.

“Sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Craig asks as he walks with John Paul to the train station. He’s asked no less than a dozen times, and it makes John Paul smile. “You know how much I love a McQueen party. Biggest thing I missed about being out here.”

“Really,” John Paul says, eyebrows raised and a grin tugging at his mouth. “Nothing else you missed about Hollyoaks than my _sisters_?”

“Well sure,” Craig says and waves his arm towards John Paul. He rocks up on the balls of his feet and then back on his heels. “You think I like you for your good looks? No, no, it’s your crazy sisters and _incredibly_ loud household that I love you for.”

John Paul snorts at that, but he can’t stop the smile that forms every time Craig slips _I love you_ so casually into conversation.

“Love you too, y’knob,” he says, and leans forward to kiss Craig on the cheek. “Go to class, you’ll be late.”

He leaves Craig there and heads off for his train.

-

“Pick me,” he tells his mum, and he almost feels calm about it. He tries to be calm, at least. Mercedes volunteers herself to die as well, and he wants to hold her hand. He wants her to hold his.

His sisters are crying. Terrified. They’ve always protected him, sheltered him to the point of smothering, and he struggles against his bonds as Jacqui screams out when their mother decides who’ll live.

Michaela and Tina. It’s not okay, none of this makes any kind of sense – he stares at Niall, at the man he’d shared a flat with and who’d comforted him after Kieron and who wants to kill them all now, and it doesn’t make sense at all.

He thinks of Kieron. He tries to breathe deeply and not cry and he thinks of Kieron’s kind smile and dusky hair and how lovely he’d looked just after a run and how much he’d loved John Paul. How he’d made John Paul feel loved again.

He can’t think about Craig. He squeezes his eyes shut the moment Craig’s face clouds his mind – smiling, looking almost bashful, eyes darting away like he can’t quite bear to let himself feel all that he wants to, a look that John Paul loves on him – and takes several shuddering breaths, forces it away. If he thinks about Craig right now he’ll fight back and try to break free. He’ll want to live.

He rails when Niall grabs Michaela, spews all the anger inside of him until Niall lets her go, and he hopes Michaela will take the chance to make a run for it with Tina.

“I killed Kieron,” Niall tells him, and John Paul denies it out of some automatic instinct, shaking his head at the possibility. It’s too horrible to be real.

A moment later there’s an explosion, and he takes a breath, closing his eyes and curling in on himself as best he can, waiting for it to end.

-

He can hear them calling for him – Michaela, screeching a bit, and then his mother, again and again. He’s grabbed, painfully, by the shoulder before he can answer, and dragged into another room.

He’s never wanted to kill someone before – he’s said it, _I’ll kill you_ , loads of times to his sisters, but he’s never actually felt the desire to end another person’s life before. He used to cry when they were children and Michaela used a magnifying glass to burn ants on the front walk. He’s never wanted to hut anyone, even something so small as a bug.

He wants to end Niall’s life.

His brother – his _brother_ – taunts him with a hand held over John Paul’s mouth. “I killed him to teach you a lesson,” he tells John Paul, and John Paul wants to end Niall’s life slowly and painfully as Kieron’s ended.

He wants to die himself, a little.

Another crash of falling beams separates them, sends John Paul crashing through floorboards into a basement or a crypt or somesuch place that’s dark and full of dust that makes him wheeze and cough. He has the momentary, absurd thought to look for his mobile, call Craig. Tell him… something. He’s not sure. His mum’s voice breaks through his thoughts, sends him stumbling up from the floor and through the darkness in search of her, in search of Michaela and Mercy and the others.

“Get away from my mum,” he tells Niall when he comes upon them. Mum is stroking Niall’s head as if he’s any real son of hers, and it makes John Paul feel ill. Niall murdered Kieron.

John Paul’s fingers tighten on the piece of metal in his hand. He feels calm. Focused. He’s going to kill Niall.

“Help me,” Niall says, sounding painfully normal, like the friend John Paul can barely remember of him now. “She’s trapped.”

John Paul notices for the first time the slab of concrete pinning his mother down. He has a wild moment where he doesn’t care; he just wants to slam the metal into Niall’s face. He’s never known it was possible to feel such all-consuming rage. It’s burning through him, roaring in his ears, his fingertips numb. It’s like something in him is screaming.

His mum cries as pieces of rock and concrete fall on her, and John Paul darts forward without thinking, pulls and shifts the slab until she can wrench herself free, but his mind is still on the task at hand. He wants her to leave him to it, and he can’t possibly understand when she tries to talk him out of it.

“He’s your brother,” she tells him, and he’s sick again at the thought. He won’t be dissuaded from this.

But he never gets his chance; they flee before more of the building can collapse on them, leaving Niall to the ruins. It’s not as satisfying as he thinks it should be.

He holds onto Michaela when they see Tina. He can’t bear to look at her and buries his face into Michaela’s hair, lets her lean into him as she cries. He leans on her and somehow they hold each other up.

He wants to go back into the rubble to find Niall and wrap his hands around the man’s throat, even if he’s already dead. His whole body hurts, and he sobs.

-

Craig’s there, at the airport, when John Paul arrives. John Paul wants to cry as soon as he sees him.

Craig’s eyes go wide when he spots John Paul, flicking up to the bruise around his eye and the scrape on his forehead. It could’ve been so much worse –

 _worse than Kieron being murdered while you were having sex?_ his mind helpfully suggests.

Craig dashes through a crowd of people to meet John Paul halfway.

“How did you – ” _know I was coming,_ John Paul means to ask, and Craig cuts him off.

“Steph phoned,” he says, and grabs John Paul by the back of the neck to pull him in. John Paul’s ribs are screaming with pain, but he presses himself against Craig and lets the other man wrap around him. “Been waiting here for hours, wondering when you’d get here,” Craig adds like a confession, whispered into John Paul’s bloody hair.

John Paul sniffs and lets himself cry into Craig’s shoulder, his sobs turning rough and wet and hacking after a moment. Craig holds him tighter and he’s not sure which one of them is shaking. Maybe both. His hands fist in the back of Craig’s shirt and Craig holds onto him even tighter. It’s painful, but at least it’s something.

“I’d’ve never forgiven you if I’d lost you,” Craig says.

Later, they lie in bed, exhausted and unable to sleep. Craig strokes his hand up and down John Paul’s side and John Paul hates how nice it feels.

“He killed Kieron,” John Paul whispers into the darkness between them. Craig’s hand stills. “He murdered him. I wanted to kill him.”

Craig doesn’t move, doesn’t say anything. John Paul doesn’t tell him that he’d actually planned on doing it.

-

He stops going to the counseling center, to his training. He supposes that he should call Carl and tell him, but he doesn’t.

Kieron didn’t commit suicide. What’s the point?

-

Craig eyes him warily. John Paul pretends not to notice, but his skin feels like it’s crawling under Craig’s scrutiny. He looks at John Paul like he’s afraid to touch him.

“You know I love you,” Craig tells him, almost a question, one night just as they’re trying to fall asleep.

“I know,” John Paul replies automatically, no feeling behind the words. He doesn’t say it back. It feels hurtful, but he’s not sure to whom.

Craig lays his hand on the space between them on the bed, but doesn’t move to touch John Paul. John Paul’s not sure he wants Craig to.

John Paul has always been prone to melodrama – you can’t be a McQueen without it – but it can’t be too over the top to say that everything he touches really does turn to shit. He’s not really sure what to say to Craig.

He ruined Kieron and he’s sure, given enough time, he’ll do the same to Craig.

-

He goes running. It doesn’t help.

He does sit-ups. It doesn’t help.

He ignores Hanna’s emails, ignores Kris’s texts, ignores Carl’s phone calls. He picks up when Michaela calls and lets her cry into her phone.

He calls his mum, puts on a calm, even tone for her and tells her that everything is fine. He doesn’t tell her how blindingly, shakingly, terribly _angry_ he is and how he doesn’t know how to make it stop. He doesn’t tell her how Craig seems afraid to touch him, and how he can’t bring himself to touch Craig.

He’s still never told anyone that he was with Craig – touching him, kissing him, fucking him – while Kieron lay dying, and all he can picture when he closes his eyes is Niall standing over Kieron while John Paul was somewhere else. He can’t run far enough or fast enough from that.

-

His ears are still ringing two weeks after the explosion, after Niall, so he doesn’t DJ. He gets a pint instead, and then another. By the time Craig shows up to meet him, John Paul has moved on to vodka, to which Craig wrinkles his nose.

“You sure you really want that?”

John Paul narrows his eyes and throws his drink back.

“You never drink stuff like that,” Craig says, almost a complaint. John Paul shrugs and orders a whiskey, holds it up after the bartender passes it to him, in mock salute to Craig. Craig looks down at his own lager.

They don’t really talk. They haven’t talked much in days. John Paul doesn’t feel any better for all the alcohol, but he doesn’t feel any worse either, so he keeps drinking until he has to rush to a toilet and throw up. Craig doesn’t say anything when he comes back to their table.

-

It’s early November. It’s cold, and John Paul can feel it deep in his body, like he won’t ever get warm.

“Why don’t you come with me to my class,” Craig says from what sounds like somewhere off in the distance. John Paul pulls the blanket further over his head. “It’s huge, my professor won’t even notice that you’re not actually a student – or we could say, um – we could say you’re a visiting student, exchange or whatever, from the States. How’s your American accent?”

John Paul doesn’t answer him. He wants to be left alone to go back to sleep. He’s got nothing to get up for and he was up late last night, just like the night before and the night before that and every other night in recent memory and he just wants to sleep now.

“You’re right, that class is boring, you’d be put right to sleep,” Craig prattles on. “Lunch maybe? We could meet somewhere, and I heard there’s a festival on in the park all week, maybe we could – ”

“Christ, Craig, would you knock it off?” John Paul bursts out without even meaning too, the blanket suddenly strewn from his face before he realizes he’s even said anything.

Craig looks at him, stunned, and John Paul feels pretty terrible. He stumbles from bed and pushes past Craig, pushes past Freddy in the hall to rush into the bathroom. He takes several deep breaths and tries to fight back his tears, unsure what he’s even crying about, and unable to leave the bathroom until he hears the front door open and close as Craig heads off to class.

He’s ruining things, and he knows it, and he can’t stop.

-

They have sex, the first time since Niall, and John Paul isn’t quite there the whole time.

 _Selfish_.

He’d been with Craig, he’d been doing this exact thing, letting Craig run his hands all over John Paul’s body, as his fiancé was being murdered, and he could’ve stopped it, but Craig’s hands feel so good, and he’d wanted Craig so, so badly, no matter how hard he’d tried to deny it.

Craig kisses him, presses their lips together and breathes against John Paul’s mouth, and John Paul wants him to and he feels traitorous and disgusting for it, like he’s being unfaithful even though there’s no one else but Craig to be unfaithful to.

After, he struggles from Craig’s grasp and throws on a shirt and sweats and stumbles outside into the chilly evening as Craig calls after him. He lets the cool air drift over his face and tries to feel alive.

-

“Go on, then!” John Paul shouts at Craig, as much out of anger as to be heard over the noise of the club.

James and Jake stand by awkwardly and watch the pair of them without saying anything. Craig looks chastened, but he doesn’t move from John Paul’s path.

“You said you wanted to go home, so go,” John Paul says again.

“I want you to come with me,” Craig tells him, dark and serious.

“I’ve got to work, I’ve got a set,” John Paul says in a rush, shaking his arm from Craig’s grasp.

“You’re drunk.”

“Am not.” John Paul turns away from him and feels his whole life going to hell, hanging on by the barest of threads.

“You’ve been drinking too much,” Craig tries again, walking around to face John Paul.

“I can take can take care of myself. And I’ve got a mum and five overbearing – ” he stops himself. His chest hurts. “Four. _Four_ overbearing sisters to tell me what to do. Don’t need it from you as well.” His sentence finishes in a bit of a hush, petered out.

“You’re _not_ , though,” Craig says, sounding sad this time instead of angry, and it makes John Paul hate himself even more. “You’re not taking care of yourself. I just wish you’d – ”

“Leave it, Craig,” John Paul tells him without much energy, and brushes past him to head towards the DJ booth. He can hear James tell Craig to leave him be for a while.

-

He almost doesn’t make it through the front door, falling twice and knocking over a potted plant on the top step. He laughs, darkly amused, and kicks at it, then feels bad for hurting it.

Perhaps that should be a metaphor for his whole life – he hurts people without thinking and then feels bad once it’s too late. He doesn’t think about other people when he’s damaging them. He thinks only of himself and what he wants.

 _Selfish._

Niall’d had them all pegged.

He struggles out of his shoes and then his slacks, leaves them in a heap on the floor as he struggles to get his shirt off and ends up tearing a couple of the buttons. He doesn’t care much, wipes his mouth of the cotton feeling with one of the sleeves.

“Y’alright?” Craig murmurs sleepily from the bed, and John Paul shushes him before crawling clumsily across the mattress towards him. “John Pau-?” Craig tries to question but John Paul presses his mouth to Craig’s before the words are out.

He licks at Craig’s lips, bites down on Craig’s lower lip after a moment, and laughs a little when Craig yelps at that.

He moves to suck on Craig’s neck and Craig takes the opportunity to try again, asking, “What’re – ?” but John Paul tells him again to “Shush,” and goes back to his mouth.

It takes a few moments to realize that Craig isn’t kissing him back, which is frustrating, so John Paul reaches for his shorts.

“Wait – ” Craig says, but John Paul doesn’t, shoving his hand in to grasp Craig’s cock.

He bites down on the underside of Craig’s chin, then his jaw, and feels lightheaded, unsure quite what he’s doing. Craig hasn’t touched him in weeks, hasn’t even tried in days, and John Paul wants something, though he’s not quite sure what. He wants his old life back. He’s not really sure what that would be anymore, now that he thinks about it. He wants to touch Craig without feeling like there’s something wrong, but this isn’t helping.

“Stop,” Craig says in a fierce whisper, and John Paul does. He sits back on his heels and feels a pit in his stomach.

Craig is breathing hard and staring at John Paul like he hardly knows him. John Paul can feel himself shaking.

They sit in silence for a long time.

“What’s wrong with you?” Craig asks him, and John Paul can’t speak for what he’s done. He doesn’t answer.

Craig swallows, shuffles to the head of the bed and brings his knees up to rest his arms on them.

“Steph’s taking Tom to Scotland for a bit. On holiday.” Craig speaks as if on autopilot. He’s staring at John Paul still. “Think I’ll go with them.”

John Paul nods, feeling his heart going wildly. It might be breaking. It’s so hard to tell these days.

He sleeps on the couch that night. Craig is gone when he wakes, but there’s a note left behind for him. He can’t bring himself to read it. Freddy makes him tea and sits with him on the couch as they watch something mindless on DVD and don’t talk at all. It’s comforting, in a way – at least someone will still be here for him when he acts like a wanker.

He’s already desperate for Craig to come back.

-

He goes back to the counseling center.

“I’m sorry,” he tells Carl, unable to explain himself just yet. “I’d like to come back,” he says.

Carl nods and doesn’t give him a lecture about responsibility and commitments and such, and John Paul’s grateful for that.

-

He tries not to call Craig, and tries not to worry when he finally does break down and dial Craig’s mobile and gets no answer.

He’s mucked things up all on his own, and he knows it. He just wants Craig back now.

“I’ll never forgive myself if I’ve lost you,” he says to Craig’s voicemail.

-

He goes looking for a new place to live. This one has never quite been his anyway. Jake goes with him, and doesn’t even look _too_ nervous when John Paul shakes on agreement with a lesbian couple, giving him an awkward thumbs-up instead. It makes John Paul smile, a little.

-

“Guess it’s only fair, y’know. I push you away, you push me away.”

John Paul looks up from the book he’s barely been reading at Craig’s voice. He startles first at the simple fact that Craig is there, and then at the bandage on Craig’s face, the bruise around his eyes. He doesn’t wait for an invitation before he rushes from the bed to pull Craig into a hug.

Craig lets him, and John Paul wants to cry with relief.

“Let’s stop doing it though, yeah?” Craig whispers into John Paul’s shoulder. John Paul nods awkwardly, doesn’t trust himself to speak just yet.

They lay on the bed – Craig’s bed, now, no longer theirs – on their sides facing each other. John Paul closes his eyes and squeezes Craig’s hand as Craig tells him about Niall.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he says, trying to keep from crumbling completely

Craig pulls him in, wraps arms around him. They stroke each other, John Paul moving his fingers over Craig’s face, his lips, his ears, unable to stop touching now when it’d felt so painful a week ago.

“Nothing to be sorry for,” Craig tells him. “Niall was a psycho. He said…” he trails off, shifts around like maybe he wants to say more but can’t, quite. “Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter now what he said. He was a psycho, but he’s gone now.”

“I’m sorry for everything,” John Paul goes on, rushing the words out in a whisper. “For everything I… I’ve been a misery to be with lately. Wouldn’t’ve blamed you if you’d just decided to stay gone.”

Craig grips him tightly by the waist, and it hurts his still bruised ribs a bit, but he opens his eyes to look at Craig and doesn’t move away.

“I think, um,” Craig says hesitantly. “I’ve been thinking that maybe, maybe you should talk to someone. About Niall, and Tina, and. And Kieron.”

“I’ll talk to you,” John Paul says, and means it now.

“You need someone more than me, I think,” Craig shakes his head. He leans forward to rest his forehead against John Paul’s. “I want you to talk to me, really I do. Even about Kieron, I know that’s, well. That’s weird for us both. But I don’t want you not to ever mention him just because you’re afraid to or something.”

John Paul closes his eyes against the tears forming. He’s not sure what to say.

“I’m scared,” is what comes out. “That… that I’ve always loved you more. Wanted you more.” He opens his eyes to look back at Craig. Craig doesn’t say anything. “He died because I wanted you more.”

Craig shakes his head at that, looks a bit frightened himself. “Please,” he whispers, sounding haunted. “Please, please. Stop doing this to yourself. I can’t take it.”

They don’t say anything else – there’s nothing much left they _can_ say this night – and in the morning John Paul tells Craig about his new flat. Craig looks stricken until John Paul explains.

“I’m not leaving you or anything.” John Paul swirls tea in his mug with a spoon, watching the water make a spiral. “I’ve just been thinking. We’ve never, y’know, properly _dated_. Like a normal couple. Maybe we need our own space for a bit.”

“Space… to date,” Craig says, working the words out slowly.

“Right,” John Paul says, and looks up at him. Craig still looks wary, like John Paul is giving him a breakup talk. He grabs Craig’s hand, laces their fingers together. “I love you,” he says. It’s the first he’s said it in weeks. “I want you. It’s always been you and me, always gonna be you and me and I’m gonna make sure of it now.”

Craig smiles, carefully, at that. It’s just on the verge of that expression that John Paul loves, like Craig’s not quite ready to let himself feel all he wants to.

“We’ve gone… fast,” John Paul goes on. “Really fast. Maybe we should try things slow for a while. Like… go out for dinner. Get a drink at the pub. Chat.”

“Then go home to our separate flats?”

John Paul shrugs. “Maybe with the occasional sleepover.”

Craig breathes a soft laugh at that. “Can I take you to dinner tomorrow?” he asks. It makes something flutter in John Paul’s chest.

“That’d be nice,” he says, and squeezes Craig’s hand.

-

They date. It’s a bit strange, at first, but John Paul calls it charming and Craig seems both amused and frustrated. They go out for dinner, and Craig insists on paying one night, John Paul the next. John Paul refrains from alcohol for a while, so they go for other types of drinks instead and make jokes about who’ll pick up the tremendous juice tab. They go home to separate flats most nights, and it’s okay.

Carl recommends a psychologist for John Paul, and John Paul takes about a week to work up the courage to call her. He’s glad when he finally does, though.

John Paul tries not to let himself fade out as he had been; he talks, when he can, and misses Kieron, and tries not to be so angry with Niall and with himself. Sometimes running even helps a bit.

He tries to let Craig love him as much as Craig wants to, and love Craig as much as he can in return.

-

It’s April, and buds are beginning to poke out of the tree branches along John Paul’s walk.

“I’ve been thinking,” he says as he plops down into the empty seat across from Craig at the café they’d arranged to meet at.

“Oh well now there’s a shock,” Craig remarks without missing a beat as his eyes flick over the menu. John Paul catches him looking up and then hurriedly back down to the menu as if he’d been caught doing something naughty.

He laughs at Craig lightly and swats at Craig’s hand with his own menu. “Been thinking,” he goes on. “Maybe I’ll look into being a counselor.”

Craig puts his menu down at that, gives John Paul his full attention. “I think that’d suit you,” he says after a moment of considering.

John Paul shrugs, ducks his head, suddenly nervous. He pushes the feeling away. “Kieron didn’t kill himself.” It doesn’t quite hurt to say his name anymore, and John Paul is glad for that. Craig doesn’t flinch at the name either, but rather listens and puts his hand on the table, there if John Paul wants to take it.

“But other people have,” John Paul continues. “Other people do. And need help with other rough spots. I think I’d like that. To help.”

He covers Craig’s hand with his own and Craig squeezes his fingers, then runs his thumb over John Paul’s knuckles.

“That sounds like a plan,” Craig says, and leans forward to kiss him lightly. John Paul smiles into it.

Achy, but still alive. Life is less and less painful all the time.

 **-end-**


End file.
